Prosecutor: Timing of steroids’ motion political

Fireworks in an Albany courtroom this morning. Link to story for that part.
ALBANY — The operator of a South Florida “wellness clinic” that steered millions of dollars worth of steroids’ prescriptions to an Orlando pharmacy has asked a judge to overturn his conviction on the grounds his sentencing has been delayed for more than five years.
An attorney for Brian Schafler, 39, of Cooper City, Fla., argued Monday in Albany County Court that his client’s sentencing has taken too long due to what he characterized as prosecutorial “negligence.”
Assistant District Attorney Christopher Baynes said the delays in sentencing Schafler and eight other defendants who have pleaded guilty to felony charges have been a result of appeals in a related case against the pharmacy’s operators. Nine people have been sentenced in the case, including two doctors who were sentenced to prison.
“How much discretion are the people going to be allowed to have?” Katzer asked Judge Stephen W. Herrick. Katzer said the delays were due to what he called “incompetency” in the district attorney’s handling of the case.
Herrick has dismissed indictments against the pharmacy’s operators twice, but also accepted felony pleas from numerous other defendants in the case, all of whom agreed to cooperate. Still, the judge told Baynes that prosecutors could have let the sentencings go forward with a request that their cooperation be ordered as a condition of their sentencing.